by Andrew Zajac

Alberto Gonzales stepped down as Attorney General more than seven months ago, but controversies from his troubled stewardship of the Justice Department still reverberate.

Former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, who was convicted of influence-peddling, recently was released from prison pending appeal of his case. Siegelman claims that his prosecution was politically motivated and that former White House advisor Karl Rove had a hand in it.

Siegelman would be much easier to dismiss as an embittered partisan pol if the Justice Department on Gonzales' watch hadn't been tainted by politics in a variety of decisions including the dismissal of nine U.S. attorneys, and by a lack of candor from the attorney general on subjects ranging from warrantless domestic wiretapping to the circumstances surrounding the prosecutors' departures.

(Don Siegelman addressed the media after release on an appeal bond from federal prison on March 28 AP Photo by Butch Dill)

Gonzales remains under departmental investigation into whether he lied in testimony to Congress, but his enduring legacy may be a politicized cadre of prosecutors.

Gonzales himself apparently is having trouble leveraging his government experience into private sector employment.

This takes some doing. Gonzales' predecessor, John Ashcroft, was mired in numerous controversies of his own but still has parlayed his service as the nation's chief law enforcement officer into an unprecedented career as a lobbyist.

Gonzales' sin, at least as the job market would view it, was the artless way he defended himself. He came across as a stonewalling tool of the White House, making it tough even for some Republicans to close ranks behind him.

Here's a story about one of his widely-panned appearances on Capitol Hill: Download file